SEATTLE (AP) — For many years, diversity in higher education has been measured by how many low-income students and students of color enroll in college. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation wants to make a dramatic change in that definition, by focusing instead on college graduation rates. The foundation, along with the National League of Cities, announced Monday that New York City ; San Francisco ; Mesa, Arizona ; and Riverside , California , will each receive $3 million over the next three years for work designed to boost college graduation. The foundation says its long-term goal is to double the number of low-income adults who earn a college degree or credential that meets job-market demands by age 26. The grants announced Monday are for aligning academic standards between high school and college, strengthening data systems, implementing early assessment and college prep strategies and creating support systems to help students get through school. In announcing the grants, the foundation pointed out the following statistics about the cities where the money will be spent: — Low-income students who graduate from Mesa Public Schools and enroll at Mesa Community College have a 5.4% graduation rate. — Ten percent of the students enrolled as first-year students at the City University of New York in 2006 had earned an associate’s degree three years later. — Riverside City College has a graduation rate of 14%. — About 27% of 9th-graders in San Francisco will go on to earn a post-secondary credential or degree. “We know that in today’s economic climate and labor market, a high school diploma is no longer enough,” said Allan Golston, president of the U.S. Program at the Gates Foundation. “We must not only ensure that young people have access to college; we must ensure that they go on to complete college and earn a degree or certificate with value in the workplace.” Since 2000, the foundation has spent $5 billion on its efforts to improve American public schools, send kids to college and, over the past few years, improve college graduation rates. Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

The gender gap among college majors once dominated by men is narrowing, and younger generations of women account for nearly half of science and business graduates, a USA TODAY analysis of new Census data shows. In 2009, about 47% of science and engineering degree holders ages 25 to 39 were women, compared with 21% among those 65 and older. For business majors, about 48% of younger graduates were female — more than double that of older generations. MAP: Participation in 2010 Census FULL COVERAGE: Census 2010 VIDEO: 10 strange facts about the Census The data, released Tuesday in the government’s annual American Community Survey, come as women this year for the first time outnumbered men in the nation’s workforce of 130 million. “Larger percentages of these professions are attracting women,” says Betty Shanahan, executive director of the Society of Women Engineers. But, she says, disparities persist among strictly engineering majors, where more than four in five are men. In the sciences, women account for a majority of graduates in psychology and the biological sciences, 2007 data from the National Science Foundation show, but trail in engineering and computer science, around 18% of both majors. “Girls see (engineering) as a very ‘white male’ profession, which it is, and they don’t get messages about how they can balance their personal lives and a very exciting career,” Shanahan says. This Census tallied, for the first time, the number of bachelor’s degrees among women and men 25 years or older. Among all majors counted — humanities, business, education, science and engineering — women under 40 had greater parity among men when compared with older generations of Americans. Still, gender pay inequities persist in the workforce: Among full-time workers in 2009, the new Census data show a woman’s median earnings were roughly 78% of a man’s ($35,549 compared with $45,485). Newer Labor Department figures from the second quarter of 2010 show women earned about 83% of a man’s median weekly wage. Overall, the new Census data show more Americans are earning college degrees, a likely byproduct of the recession. Those with a bachelor’s degree or higher rose from 27% in 2006 to almost 28% in 2009.

A couple million sets of U.S. parents just realized a dream: They sent sons and daughters off to colleges. Most immediately set their sights on a new dream: attending graduation ceremonies at those colleges. But right about now, some are getting the first clues that might not happen. A few know it won’t — because their kids have already dropped out. “I had a student leave the first week,” says Marcus Hotaling, a psychologist who directs the counseling center at Union College in Schenectady , N.Y. FRESHMEN YEAR: May be harder on parents than students THE TURKEY DROP: Some want to call college quits by Thanksgiving LAST PARENTING, PART II: Sweet 16 even sweeter without a car “It does happen,” says Marjorie Savage, parent program director at the University of Minnesota -Twin Cities. In fact, surveys by ACT (the non-profit company behind the ACT test) show one-third of freshman do not become sophomores at the colleges where they started. ACT doesn’t track how many students drop out in less than a year, transfer to another school or return later. But just under half get degrees from the colleges where they first enrolled (within three years for associate degrees or five years for bachelor’s degrees). “The numbers are dreadful, and the freshman year is key,” says James Boyle, president of College Parents of America in Arlington, Va. That might strike panic into parents already getting distress signals: •A drumbeat of negativity , via calls, e-mail, online status updates and other communications. A little homesickness is normal. But a student calling home “multiple times a day, crying or angry, overreacting to little things” is in trouble, Hotaling says. Savage says struggling freshmen say things like: “I can’t sleep. I hate the food here. I don’t like the people. It’s not what I expected.” •No communication. “There’s a lot of pressure to succeed,” Hotaling says. So when things don’t go well, students often don’t want parents to know. •Bad grades. Those are almost a rite of passage, “a reality check that typically comes in the first four weeks,” Savage says. But if the bad news is still coming four weeks after that, she says, “you might start to worry more.” College students who live at home can show many of the same signs, Savage notes — and are at high risk for dropout due to the competing demands of school, home and, often, a job. Also at high risk: students who came to school with a disability or a mental illness such as depression. Hotaling recalls one bright young man with a form of autism who came 3,000 miles and “didn’t last the semester because he couldn’t handle the social aspects.” And sometimes leaving is the right thing, he says. But, often, parents can help students stay put, without jumping in and taking over. “Stay in touch and provide coaching,” Boyle says. Remind students that academic advisers, counselors and others are there to help, he says. Encourage students to get involved in campus clubs, teams and activities, Savage says. “Typically, if you give them a few weeks, they are going to adjust,” Hotaling says. But, he adds, if you are concerned about safety — and, especially, suicide — don’t hesitate to call the campus counseling center and ask for help.

NEWARK, New Jersey (AP) — New Jersey has already thrown enough money at its largest school district to make it among the nation’s best-funded, yet it remains in the pits. Can a $100 million gift from the founder of Facebook really turn it around? The money hasn’t even arrived, but it’s already creating a buzz in Newark, where three out of five third-graders can’t read and write at their grade level. Barely half the students who begin high school manage to graduate, and most of them do so without passing the state’s standard graduation exam. “This money makes us feel good about ourselves, that we’re being noticed,” said 15-year-old Estephany Balbuena, a student at Newark’s Arts High School. “There’s a bad reputation of Newark, but it’s not true. Some of us are successful.” The three players seeking to turn the windfall into a renaissance — a 26-year-old Internet wunderkind, a Democratic mayor described by Oprah Winfrey as a “rock star” and a Republican governor drawing criticism and acclaim for his budget-slashing ways — announced their plans Friday on Winfrey’s talk show. FACEBOOK CEO: Donating $100 million to Newark schools REACTION: Facebook friends Newark Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said he would donate $100 million worth of Facebook stock over the next five years through his new Start-up: Education foundation. Gov. Chris Christie said he would give Mayor Cory Booker a major role in overseeing any major changes in the district, which the state took over in 1995 because of persistently low test scores and wasteful spending. Booker pledged to raise an additional $150 million for the effort. “What’s the alternative? Is it to continue what we’re doing now, with nearly a 50% dropout rate?” Christie said. “I’m much more willing to take risks and take chances when it comes to this.” Zuckerberg paid a visit to Newark on Saturday, spending time with Booker and holding a press conference with the mayor and the governor at a downtown hotel. The three were short on specifics, saying that a key first step of the process would be getting community input on changes that need to be made. Recounting how his grandmother had been a teacher and his parents had worked hard to give himself and his three sisters a good education, Zuckerberg said he hoped to do the same, not just for thousands of Newark students, but to help create a new model for successful public education that could be replicated nationwide. He dismissed questions about the timing of his donation, which coincides with the release of a movie about Facebook that portrays him in a less than flattering light. “This (donation) is something that’s going to play out for years,” he said. New Jersey’s Supreme Court has found in rulings over the past two decades that urban schools were underfunded and ordered the government to fund the most impoverished districts as well as its most affluent suburban schools. The court has also pushed the state to spend billions to upgrade school buildings in cities and provide free preschool for 3- and 4-year-olds. While some areas have seen gains, most of those schools still fall far short on measures such as standardized tests and graduation rates. Money alone doesn’t seem to be the answer, but money is what wealthy funders can offer. Through his foundation, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates — like Zuckerberg, a Harvard dropout — awarded $290 million in education grants in November 2009, including $100 million to the school system that includes Tampa, and $90 million for the Memphis, district. The foundation has also given $150 million to the New York City schools over the past eight years. Most of the funding in New York has gone toward the creation of smaller schools that aim to boost graduation rates for the most academically challenged students; several teachers also participate in a foundation-led training program. One recent study of Gates’ efforts found that graduation rates in those schools had improved. The Star-Ledger of Newark reported Saturday that Gates, among a roster of current and new donors, had expressed interest in donating to the Newark initiative. Booker would not confirm the donation but said several donors had made pledges since Zuckerberg’s announcement, and that he would release details soon. Florida’s Hillsborough County district, the nation’s eighth-largest, is designing a way to pay teachers, in part, by using a system that includes measuring gains with standardized tests, along with observations by principals and evaluations by other teachers. The money is also being used to train veteran teachers to mentor others. The evaluation program is just beginning, so it’s too early to tell how it will work, district spokeswoman Linda Cobbe said. The district, though, has gotten positive comments from new teachers about the mentoring program, she said. Similar measures are underway in Memphis, where school officials are working out how to identify, reward and retain effective teachers. “We are seeing results of our plan,” said Superintendent Kriner Cash. “We are right on target.” Education advocates in New Jersey call for similar steps to be taken in Newark, where more money is spent per pupil than any other city in a state that ranks near the top in per-pupil funding. Newark was once booming, with its 1940s population of about 430,000 working in good-paying jobs in the teeming textile and manufacturing industries. But after World War II , the city began a postwar descent into racial unrest, white flight, crime and corruption. Its population suffered — it’s now down to around 275,000 — along with its schools. Few steps on Newark’s path are clear beyond hiring a new superintendent. On her show, Winfrey endorsed current Washington, D.C., Chancellor Michelle Rhee , who has implemented changes popular among school reform advocates. Rhee wasn’t available to comment to The Associated Press. Joseph De Pierro, education dean at New Jersey’s Seton Hall University, said his advice would be for Newark first to consider hiring back at least some of the educators laid off this year. Students say they’ve seen the effects, with some sports teams eliminated and classes growing. “There are now 40 students in my math class; it’s suffocating,” said Balbuena, the Arts High student. De Pierro would also find a way to pay the best teachers more and buy better equipment and materials. And he noted that better training would be key. “It would not be the standard kind of stuff after school and in the summer,” he said. “It would be something that takes place in their classroom when they’re teaching.” Derrell Bradford, executive director of Excellent Education for Everyone, a Newark-based group that is pushing to broaden school choice in New Jersey, said some of the steps he would take in Newark wouldn’t cost much. For instance, he would give charter schools unused space in traditional public schools and set up virtual learning programs in which the best teachers could come into contact — online, at least — with more children. He said he would also look for a way to pay top teachers more and exempt them from union work rules. Any major changes might require buy-in from union members who have vehemently opposed Christie’s school cuts. Newark Teachers Union President Joseph Del Grosso said he hopes the decision makers will consult with teachers about their plans — but said he is excited about the gift. Christie had choice words Saturday for the unions and others he said have been an obstacle to education reforms in New Jersey. “We’re about yes, they’re about no. We’re about tomorrow, they’re about yesterday. We’re about the kids; they’re about their paychecks,” he said. David Sciarra, executive director of the Education Law Center, which advocates for students in the state’s poorest cities, said he worries the new measures could undo the progress that’s already been made. The city has developed one of the nation’s best early childhood education programs, and middle and high schools are improving, he said. “The question is how to make sure this money is used to enhance the reforms that have been made and not to undermine them,” he said. Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Waiting for Superman begins with a simple question: What’s four minus two? The answer takes achingly long for Anthony, an elementary school student in inner-city Washington. Anthony isn’t dumb; he’s more thoughtful than just about any child you’ll meet. He’s simply applying what he learned in public school. Which isn’t much. That’s the overarching theme of Davis Guggenheim ‘s masterful picture, which vaults itself among the year’s best films. TRAILER: Get a peek of ‘Waiting for Superman’ And while Guggenheim’s point — that public schools are failing our children — may not be an earth-shaker, remember: This is the guy who won an Oscar for turning a PowerPoint presentation into An Inconvenient Truth . He works some of the same magic here, but by essentially making a reverse image of Truth . Where Guggenheim stoked political friction with Al Gore as Truth ‘s tempest, he mostly steers clear of politics here in favor of the children’s stories. It’s a brilliant move, because you won’t find more compelling stories than Anthony’s, Bianca’s in Harlem and Daisy’s in Los Angeles, among others. These are kids who not only want a tougher education, they’re gambling on one. The families in Waiting have entered a lottery whose winners get to leave their substandard schools for a mediocre one. The final 10 minutes, as the kids await word if their numbers were called, is as compelling as any feature film. When Guggenheim asks the boy what a better school would mean for him, Anthony answers quickly: more homework, less television, less playtime. Does he want to get in? You bet. Asked why: “So my kids have a better future than I did.” It’s hard to argue that he, like all kids in the film, isn’t profoundly teachable, and that’s Guggenheim’s real mission: to put a face on an intractable debate. The director does get a little heated in his attack on the teachers union, which he accuses of putting politics ahead of pupils. Instead of wading into Michael Moore-like diatribes, though, Guggenheim deflates the tension with a confession: He drives by public schools every morning to take his kids to private schools. Guggenheim does his homework, including statistics on the success of the KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) schools to counter assertions that poor neighborhoods produce poor institutions. And there are startling images of “problem teachers” sent to a professional detention. The title comes from Geoffrey Canada, president and CEO of the Harlem Children’s Zone. He explains he once saw Superman on TV and thought George Reeves would one day swoop in to save him and his classmates. It’s an apt title. As divisive as the issue has become, it’s hard to deny the power of Guggenheim’s lingering shots on these children, waiting on a superhero who isn’t going to come.

Stagnant scientific education imperils U.S. economic leadership, says a report by leading business and science figures. Released Thursday at a congressional briefing attended by senators and congressmen of both parties, the report updates a 2005 science education report that led to moves to double federal research funding. Nevertheless, the “Rising Above the Gathering Storm” review finds little improvement in U.S. elementary and secondary technical education since then. “Our nation’s outlook has worsened,” concludes the report panel headed by former Lockheed Martin chief Norman Augustine . The report “paints a daunting outlook for America if it were to continue on the perilous path it has been following”: •U.S. mathematics and science K-12 education ranks 48th worldwide. •49% of U.S. adults don’t know how long it takes for the Earth to circle the sun. •China has replaced the United States as the world’s top high-technology exporter. Although U.S. school achievement scores have stagnated, harming the economy as employers look elsewhere for competent workers, the report says that other nations have made gains. If U.S. students matched Finland ‘s, for example, analysis suggests the U.S. economy would grow 9%-16%. “The real point is that we have to have a well-educated workforce to create opportunities for young people,” says Charles Vest, head of the National Academy of Engineering , a report sponsor. “Otherwise, we don’t have a chance.” “The current economic crisis makes the link between education and employment very clear,” says Steven Newton of the National Center for Science Education in Oakland. In 2007, however, an analysis led by B. Lindsay Lowell of Georgetown University found U.S. science education worries overstated. It saw three times more science and engineering college graduates than job openings each year. Other reports have found top science and engineering students migrating to better-paying jobs in finance, law and medicine, since the 1990s.

WASHINGTON — Bouncing from home to home exacts a significant toll on a child’s ability to learn. Preliminary data from a 10-year study released Thursday, looking at how California foster kids stack up against their at-risk peers, suggests that academic challenges posed by poverty, disability and language barriers are compounded when those children also have to shuffle from school to school because they have no permanent family. The study, conducted by researchers at the University of California at Berkeley , shows that foster children consistently scored lower in state English and math tests, even when factors such as income, race and learning disabilities were taken into account. The findings confirm earlier studies analyzing foster children in the Midwest and Washington state but the final California report, due out later this year, will be the first to examine how different circumstances within the foster care network affect student learning, researchers said. The data was released at a Capitol Hill news conference by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute and Fostering Media Connections, which are hoping to spotlight the issue in Congress. Legislation, sponsored by Sen. Al Franken , D-Minn., would direct child-welfare agencies to collaborate with local school districts to ensure that foster children remain in their current schools after they move to new school districts if it’s in their best interest. There are some 400,000 children in foster care at any one time in the United States. The average time a child spends in the foster care system is about 27 months, advocates say. No one needs to promote the importance of stability to Christina Miranda, a foster child from the Reading, Pa., area who shuttled among 10 different schools between the ages of 5 and 18. At 13, Christina thought she had finally found a permanent school — until she was told one afternoon that she had three hours to leave because she was being sent to another family in another community. “I remember moving to that new foster home,” she said during the news conference. “I had this new room. I’m in a new town. I’m with a new foster care agency. New school. New teachers. New friends. That can be very traumatizing for a child, but to have to go through that all the times that I did, it’s unbelievable.” Rep. Michele Bachmann , R-Minn., who has been a foster parent to 23 children — all teenage girls — said she’s not surprised how important a permanent home is for a student who may be struggling with the complexities of algebra or the intricacies of grammar. “The one thing we learned in foster care is that stability is very important in a child’s life,” she said. “Children need a sense of place.” Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

The decade after high school graduation is filled with lots of dreams. Then real life sets in — and sometimes turns those plans upside down. Such is the premise of the new ABC series My Generation , which revisits a group of classmates from Austin 10 years after their high school graduation in 2000. The documentary-style show imagines that a filmmaker who followed them just prior to graduation and recorded their hopes for the future is now back in their lives to see how things worked out. “In some ways, what’s good about revisiting these characters is it’s the first real moment of adulthood,” says My Generation writer/creator Noah Hawley, 42. In the show, these 28-year-olds’ plans for school, marriage, kids or life in general didn’t quite happen the way they had envisioned. And for real-life 28-year-olds, the same is often true. In one Baltimore-area Class of 2000, which was followed for 13 years by USA TODAY, two students got pregnant. One is almost $300,000 in debt from school. One moved back home for almost a year. One is a caregiver for an ill parent. These Millennials (considered the oldest year of the generation sometimes called Generation Y ) do exhibit a significant characteristic of their generation: an optimism for the future and ambition to make it happen, suggests historian and demographer Neil Howe, whose books on this age group include the most recent Millennials in the Workplace, published this year. “Despite what the recession has done to them — and this is striking — they still have not given up. They have ambitious lifetime goals,” he says. “This generation remains strikingly optimistic long-term, and they believe in staying on a path with long-term goals, despite very high unemployment and a tough economy.” In 1987, USA TODAY began following 17 students in a kindergarten class at Swansfield Elementary School in Columbia, Md., who would be the Class of 2000 when they graduated from high school. Of the original 17, just eight were still in the area when we wrote about them in 2000. Now, we check back in with those we were able to contact to see what their lives are like at age 28: Ashkan Dorri He moved to California in third grade and lived in L.A. until last year. After a year in AmeriCorps and an MBA, he got a government job in information technology but was laid off last year. Then his dad had a stroke, and he moved to Reston, Va., to help out. “Sometimes things in life throw you on a different tangent. Those give you more character, and you learn from it. I’m optimistic something will happen.” Chanelle Matthews She still wants to teach, but a degenerative eye disorder forced her to quit community college for a corneal transplant. She has a 2-year-old son and has worked full time for the past decade as a telecom coordinator in Columbia, Md. She also takes a full-time load of classes online. “I have the same expectations I had,” she says. “I thought I’d go on to a four-year university. I had minor setbacks, but I’m still trying.” Chad Jensen After graduating from Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, he planned to be a pediatrician, then a pilot, but 9/11 changed that. He’ll finish dental school in May 2012. “I’ll be over $300,000 in debt,” he says. He got married in 2006 and lives in Pittsburgh with his wife and 4-month-old son. “I wish I was a little bit further along in my schooling, but life is a journey.” Marissa Schwartz She studied psychology at High Point (N.C.) University but got pregnant sophomore year and put school on hold. She lives in Plantation, Fla., near the father of her two daughters, 8 and 6. She’ll finish studies in August to be a dental hygienist and is working on a bachelor’s. “I thought life was going to be different, but I’m more mature because I had to grow up.” Dave Earley A psychology grad from Salisbury University, he moved back with his parents from November 2004 to October 2005. He lives in Essex, Md., and started his current job in clinical research in 2005. He’s getting married Saturday. “In a lot of ways, I am definitely where I thought I would be at 28,” he says. Matt McCathorine A graduate of the University of Maryland in College Park, he is now an engineer, as planned. Five years ago, he bought a house in Owings Mills, Md. “I’m kind of in a position where I feel like I have all these grown-up responsibilities at work and I own a home, and still I’m a single guy in between the being-married-with-kids life and the college life,” he says. “When you’re young, you think 28 is old. But once you get to 28, you realize you’re not old. You’re young,” he says. Where are you? Class of 2000 members Lorrie Crizer and Paul Sutusky, left center in 2000 photo, could not be reached for an update. READERS: Do you know anyone who graduated high school in 2000 or thereabouts? What do you think distinguishes them as a generation? Are you among them? Share your experiences and views in the comments below:

NASHVILLE — Offering middle-school math teachers bonuses up to $15,000 did not produce gains in student test scores, Vanderbilt University researchers reported Tuesday in what they said was the first scientifically rigorous test of merit pay. The results (pdf) could amount to a cautionary flag about paying teachers for the performance of their students, a reform strategy the Obama administration and many states and school districts have favored despite lukewarm support or outright opposition from teachers’ unions. The U.S. Department of Education has put a great deal of effort into prodding school districts and states to try merit-pay systems as part of its Race to the Top competition, although teachers’ unions have often objected on the grounds that they don’t have fair and reliable ways to measure performance. In most school districts, teacher pay is based on years of experience and educational attainment levels. The report’s authors, of the National Center on Performance Incentives (NCPI) at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College of Education, stress that theirs is just one approach. The Nashville teachers who hit the mark based on their students’ test scores received a bump in their paychecks but no additional mentoring or professional development. Neither their principals nor fellow teachers knew who participated in the experiment or who received bonuses. Matthew G. Springer, director of the federally funded NCPI, said pay-for-performance is not “the magic bullet that so often the policy world is looking for.” At least in this experiment, Springer said, “it doesn’t work.” The study was conducted from 2006 to 2009 in partnership with the nonprofit RAND Corporation . A local industrialist and Vanderbilt benefactor, Orrin Ingram, put up the nearly $1.3 million in bonuses. Some 296 middle-school math teachers — two-thirds of the district’s middle-school math teachers — volunteered to participate in the experiment. Half were placed randomly in a control group, while the rest were eligible for bonuses of $5,000, $10,000 or $15,000 if their pupils scored significantly higher than expected on the statewide exam known as the Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program. One third of the eligible teachers — 51 of 152, or 34% — got bonuses at least once. Eighteen teachers received bonuses all three years. Except for some temporary gains for fifth-graders, though, their students progressed no faster than those in classes taught by the 146 other teachers. The local teachers’ union in Nashville agreed to the experiment in collective bargaining, according to Erick Huth, president of the Metropolitan Nashville Education Association. He said the results were not at all surprising. “I’ve believed for a long time that what improves instruction is having an instructional leader who is able to get all players in a school to collaborate,” Huth said The bonuses amounted to as much as 30% of teachers’ yearly salaries here in the Music City, where the scale runs from $36,000 to $64,000, Huth said. The nation’s 3.2 million public school teachers earned $53,910 on average in 2008-09, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. The study was released at a two-day conference, “Evaluating and Rewarding Educator Effectiveness,” at Vanderbilt’s Peabody College that drew participants from Colorado, Georgia, Tennessee, Washington, D.C. and other places conducting their own experiments with performance pay. Some states have moved to tie teacher and principal evaluations to student test scores. The study did not shake the faith of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan in merit pay. “While this is a good study, it only looked at the narrow question of whether more pay motivates teachers to try harder,” said Sandra Abrevaya, a spokeswoman for Duncan. It did not address the Obama administration’s push to “change the culture of teaching by giving all educators the feedback they need to get better.” The Nashville experiment, known as POINT (Project on Incentives in Teaching), doled out the $15,000 bonuses to those teachers whose students performed “at a level that historically had been reached by only the top 5% of middle school math teachers.” Teacher performance was calculated by using a value-added model, which predicts how students will do in a given year based on how they performed in the previous year. The teachers had to hit the 80th and 90th percentiles to pocket the $5,000 and $10,000 bonuses, respectively. The study’s design, in which teachers were judged against percentile benchmarks rather than their colleagues’ performance, sought to preserve collaboration among teachers. In surveys about the program, most teachers said they were already effective without the incentive of additional pay. Eight in ten said they didn’t change the way they taught to improve their odds of earning a bonus. Many teachers came close to getting a bonus — so close that they would have qualified if their pupils answered two or three more questions correctly on the 55-question state exam. The Nashville math teachers, according to the study, “expressed moderately favorable views toward performance pay in general, though less so for POINT in particular.” The experiment ran smoothly, although the teachers became less enthusiastic over the three years. “They did not come away … thinking it had harmed their schools,” the study said. “But by and large, they did not endorse the notion that bonus recipients were better teachers.” The fact that many fifth-grade teachers teach multiple subjects to the same students may have been a reason for the positive impact of merit pay found in fifth grade, according to the study’s authors. But “the effect did not last. By the end of 6th grade it did not matter whether a student’s 5th grade math teacher had been in the treatment or control group,” the study said. The researchers said the Nashville experiment didn’t stir the negative reactions that have attended some other merit pay programs, but it “simply did not do much of anything.” Springer of NCPI said the study lays a foundation for further experiments on a topic that educators have been debating “for over a century.” Tennessee Commissioner of Education Timothy Webb said the Nashville study shows, “Money alone is not enough to encourage people to go into challenging schools and teach the most difficult students.” He stressed the importance of improving teachers’ working conditions, not just their pay. Frederick M. Hess, director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., said he does not believe the study says much of value and worries it will only confuse the issue. “The fact that that teachers don’t respond to cash bonuses like rats do to food-pellets does nothing to diminish my confidence that it’s good for schooling if teacher pay better reflects the contributions that teachers make,” Hess said. “Serious proponents of merit pay believe the point is not any kind of short-term test-score bump but making the profession more attractive to talented candidates.” William Slotnik, executive director of the Boston-based Institute for Compensation Reform and Student Learning at the Community Training and Assistance Center, has argued that performance-based compensation tied directly to the educational mission of a school district can be a lever to transform schools. But he said it will take more than financial incentives to improve student achievement and that merit pay “is hard to get right. … If all you are doing is focusing on money, there is no track record in that resulting in the kind of changes needed to do this work well.” Contributing: Christopher Connell is a freelance writer. Liz Willen contributed to this article. It was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonpartisan education-news outlet affiliated with the Hechinger Institute on Education and the Media at Columbia University

Drury University junior Garret Shelenhamer ditched his car and gets to his classes and volunteer commitments using a shiny, new bike provided by the school. Shelenhamer is one of a number of students across the USA taking advantage of free or low-cost bike-sharing programs, which have become increasingly popular. Drury students agreed to pay a $20-a-year sustainability fee, which funds the bike program. The Springfield, Mo., school purchased 40 new bikes for use by students in time for the fall semester. “It’s helped me so much. It’s been fun,” Shelenhamer said. BIKE POWER: Gyms retrofit bikes to produce electricity DENVER: Bike-share program takes off Nearly 90 American universities, from New York University to the University of Alaska-Anchorage , offer some form of campus bike program, according to the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. Programs have launched or will launch this year at a wide range of universities, including Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville; John Carroll University in University Heights, Ohio; the University of Cincinnati ; Coastal Carolina University in Conway, S.C.; Samford University in Birmingham, Ala .; Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken , N.J.; and North Carolina State University in Raleigh, N.C . “The demand is coming from students,” says Jeremy Friedman, manager of sustainability initiatives at New York University. This summer, NYU kicked off a pilot bike share program with a fleet of 30 bikes available for free checkout from the front desk of many residence halls. Fueling the demand are the public embrace of biking culture, new miles of bike lanes and the economic recession that has many tightening their spending, Friedman says. “In the future, we may find ourselves in the role of trying to encourage more biking, but for now, we are behind the demand,” he says. “We’re just trying to keep up.” Wendy Anderson, director of campus sustainability at Drury, says the bike program appeals to students, who are active and likely to grumble about costs associated with a car. “I think universities are trying to keep up with the increasing competitive nature of higher education,” Anderson says. “I’m not saying this is a recruiting tool, but it offers a richer experience in student life.” At College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, Minn., students came up with the idea for a bike program and made it a reality in April, college spokeswoman Diane Hageman says. The program offers 30 bikes for free, daily checkout until the first snowfall, Hageman says. Paul Rowland, executive director of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, says bike programs have found fertile soil on college campuses. “One thing about the campus is it has a fairly high density of individuals, students as well as staff. It is relatively defined, and there are a lot of movements every hour or every half an hour,” he says. Bikes help alleviate traffic congestion, improve campus safety and reduce greenhouse gas emission, Rowland says. In 2008, faced with a parking crisis, the University of New England in Biddeford, Maine, raised parking permit fees and began to give away free bikes to freshman students who promised not to bring cars to campus, university spokeswoman Kathleen Taggersell says. Since then, the university has given out 530 bikes and, as a direct result of the program, turned a 95-space parking lot into a basketball court with a river-view tent for university events, Taggersell says. University bike programs are usually funded by an internal grant or a student fee, Rowland says. Bikes are checked out differently. Some programs require membership, some are free, and some charge a rental fee. Though many schools rely on staff to check out bikes, some have gone high-tech. This fall, Washington State University in Pullman installed a $140,000 automated system for its bike program, says Jamie Bentley, the environmental well-being coordinator at WSU. Students swipe their identification cards to unlock a bike from one of the four docking stations on campus, Bentley says. The convenience has drastically boosted the use of the bike program: 454 people checked out a bike in the first two weeks this fall, compared with 583 users last year, Bentley says. Tang reports for the Springfield (Mo.) News-Leader .